Support NeoGAF

[Gen X]

Forgive me, but am I supposed to be seeing a difference there?

That's what I thought when I saw some screens. The pop up was the only thing that was obvious to me, but even then when you think of how many people put up with San Andreas on the PS2 this really seems like over reating in comparison.

The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away lol.

 

[Ravensmash]

They sure had a lot of bugs then which reduce graphical effects by accident. AF, POM, draw distance, and collision modelling?

I'm not a game developer so I'm not going to try and explain it haha.

That being said, no developer or business is going to go to the effort of removing things for no apparent reason

 

[MrCunningham]

What's up with Rockstar downgrading their games lately?

First they downgrade GTA:SA on PC, now this.

But hey, at least they added swaying foliage...

 

[Roberto Larcos]

You don't ship a console in late 2013 with gimped hardware and call it "next gen".

So when machines with half a gig of RAM were still being referred to as current gen in mid-2013, what would you call the Xbox One and PS4?

You're just making up arbitrary shit to piss people off. There's absolutely no defending what you wrote, it's trolling, pure and simple. I don't like the new 'new' VW Beetle, doesn't mean I no longer recognise that it exists. I also don't say that this Beetle doesn't count as the next-gen Beetle, because its 0-60 is pretty damn slow. I accept it and move on. Stop being such a child, damn.

Also then, what 'gen' is the 3DS?

 

[PSYGN]

Honestly hadn't noticed anything, but I hope that collision was a fluke. Is it really that static, now?

 

[dr guildo]

Ok, So Downgrade there is, then I will uninstall the game tonight, and reinstall it without the patch...

Edit : Don't care about Heist DLC, so...

 

[Gen X]

Yes, I remember.

The only difference is both consoles have particularly weak CPU's and GPU's that have already lost their bragging rights (hell, the CPU's were never good to begin with) -- what baffles me is because they are both based on x86 (PS4 and Xbone that is), it would have been easier now more than ever before to get stronger hardware in the box.

You couldn't have the price we got at launch if the consoles were higher spec'd. Given the price for the PS2 & PS3 here in NZ I am glad Sony went the path they did. The PS4 was $400 cheaper at launch than the PS2 & PS3 and was $250 cheaper than the PSone launched at.

 

[Yoshi88]

Ok, So Downgrade there is, then I will uninstall the game tonight, and reinstall it without the patch...

Edit : Don't care about Heist DLC, so...

But you'll also loose the swaying foliage, won't you?

 

[ktroopa]

They fixed the tree animations so they can FIX this!

 

[ZeroCDR]

Yikes, I guess I can always delete the patches for single player, but isn't the retail version plagued by static trees? lol

I can't win!

 

[dr guildo]

But you'll also loose the swaying foliage, won't you?

I think no, I won't, because I remember that swaying foliage was in a previous update. I will just download all the patches released before the Heist one, and then block that one, it will be easy because the Heist patch is the biggest in size, and it will take much more time to download than all the patches reunited...

 

[Wil348]

Even if it has been downgraded, I can barely even notice it and that's when it's pointed out to me. Still, I'm willing to bet that this is a bug similar to the tree animations and the car deformation.

 

[Diablos]

Did you mean to type runs better? Because myself and a few others have noticed that the visuals online looked slightly worse after the latest update, and the performance slightly improved.

My friend who owns the game told me the same thing. Slightly better framerate but less detailed visuals, with whatever bug issues regarding heists and whatnot addressed (per the notes anyway).

Why would they force a downgrade in visuals if there weren't many complaints about performance beforehand? Did they feel as though it wasn't performing properly by their own standards or did they have to do this to allow the patch to address the issues at hand (although, the patch notes don't provide much info as to what those issues are besides GTA Online)?

So when machines with half a gig of RAM were still being referred to as current gen in mid-2013, what would you call the Xbox One and PS4?

You're just making up arbitrary shit to piss people off. There's absolutely no defending what you wrote, it's trolling, pure and simple. I don't like the new 'new' VW Beetle, doesn't mean I no longer recognise that it exists. I also don't say that this Beetle doesn't count as the next-gen Beetle, because its 0-60 is pretty damn slow. I accept it and move on. Stop being such a child, damn.

Also then, what 'gen' is the 3DS?

I'm not trying to piss anyone off and I'm not trolling you, I don't appreciate being labeled as these things. I'm trying to figure out why they actually downgraded the visuals, what the justification was for it. If it's because PS4/Xbone can't handle all the changes the patch made without downgrading visuals, which is really the only logical explanation I could think of, then that could prove to be a problem as time goes on and games need to be patched for whatever reason. Seriously -- why else would you downgrade visuals when the vast majority of people who played this game before 1.08 had no complaints whatsoever about performance? It's a perfectly legitimate question to ask, and my "arbitrary" post you refer to as a means to pissing everyone off was merely speculation; I was not posting anything as though it were absolute fact.

As for my rant about the hardware, I just think it's silly in regards to other tech they could have used. There had to be a better solution for the CPU while still maintaining a $400 price point.

 

[thiscoldblack]

Ah great, and I finally opened some time for this weekend to play the ps4 version for the first time.

 

[Slaythe]

So many times you hear people sayig they'd much rather have a better framerate at the expense of graphics and then you get all these over reactions. Personally, if it was that bigger issue I'd just delete the update. It's not the end of the world. ;-)

Can't they just give people the choice ?

Plus, they have to decide that BEFOREHAND.

They don't release an ok looking game to make it look even worse with an update 5 months after release.

 

[doofy102]

I think no, I won't, because I remember that swaying foliage was in a previous update. I will just download all the patches released before the Heist one, and then block that one, it will be easy because the Heist patch is the biggest in size, and it will take much more time to download than all the patches reunited...

Just so you know, there've been rumours about downgrades since before the heists patch (with regards to vehicle damage, maybe the tessellation which I bet were downgraded before the heists patch) it's just now it's finally being documented.

 

[dan2026]

A stabler framerate framerate is always preferable over more graphical bells and whistles.

But the game should of come out like this. Not downgraded later.

 

[Saintguine]

Atleast the lighting system wasn't completely gutted I guess.

 

[LeeRoyBrown]

When I saw the first image I thought, well maybe if it runs a buttload better for 1 effect thats fine.

Then I watched the video.

Fuck me, just blanked downgrade everything.

Now that the reviews are done, downgrade that shit!

 

[Gen X]

Can't they just give people the choice ?

You must be new to consoles. ;-)

 

[Diablos]

A stabler framerate framerate is always preferable over more graphical bells and whistles.

But the game should of come out like this. Not downgraded later.

Perhaps they did not have a choice given what they felt needed to be in the patch... that's what I am trying to figure out, and what it implies for games on PS4/Xbone in general when a major update is required after an extended period of time: Is it an unanticipated downgrade in graphical quality in exchange for a more stable experience? Is this going to be a trend?

 

[AgentP]

I don't buy this simply because it worked without issue before. Disabling it doesn't seem to have gained them anything (at least based on what we'be seen).

I'd bet it's an issue similar to the tree bug it launched with.

Didn't NX Gamer just report better frame rates on the ps4 with the latest patch? Get to work DF!

 

[Ravensmash]

When I saw the first image I thought, well maybe if it runs a buttload better for 1 effect thats fine.

Then I watched the video.

Fuck me, just blanked downgrade everything.

Now that the reviews are done, downgrade that shit!

They must be spending hundreds of man hours purposefully changing things for no reason, other than to annoy those pesky gamers.

 

[DJSharpeCheddar]

I don't know if anyone mentioned this in this thread, but I've noticed that at some point they seemingly patched out a whole feature in single player?

I remember RIGHT when I bought the game, the in-game phone had a "Checklist" option or something like that where I could look at all my available missions and sidejobs that went towards 100% completion. After resetting, that option has been replaced by "Jobs" which never has anything on it and I guess refers to online functionality.

Does anybody know what happened to the checklist? It seemed really useful!

 

[mckmas8808]

Just shows you how limited these consoles are.

NOPE!

 

[U n i o n 0015]

Just watched the whole vid. I hope it's just an accident and Rockstar releases a new patch. The game is gorgeous and already ran really, really well so I don't see what in the Heists update could've warranted the intentional downgrading of a lot of effects.

 

[doofy102]

We don't really know if the ground's downgrade was caused by 1.08. It might've been before. I remember noticing the ground didn't look as great as I remembered before 1.08 even came out. If we really want to be theorising what happened, more information is required.

 

[PreFire]

I don't know if anyone mentioned this in this thread, but I've noticed that at some point they seemingly patched out a whole feature in single player?

I remember RIGHT when I bought the game, the in-game phone had a "Checklist" option or something like that where I could look at all my available missions and sidejobs that went towards 100% completion. After resetting, that option has been replaced by "Jobs" which never has anything on it and I guess refers to online functionality.

Does anybody know what happened to the checklist? It seemed really useful!

Yea, once you play with an online connection, the checklist option gets replaced by "Jobs"

On topic, I haven't noticed the downgrade, won't watch the video because then it will make me aware of it.. I want to enjoy GTA

 

[Skenzin]

Honestly this probably for the best. The PS4 versions framerate affected my overall enjoyment of the game. And Im not one of those 60fps or gtfo nazis

 

[Zane]

Error my ass. Toning down many different graphical settings at this point is not just caused by a mysterious error.

How do you know?

 

[Subxero]

Looks like I'll have to do a reinstall and turn off automatic updates. My Brother and I just started playing this again and we thought something seemed off. This was before the most recent patch too.

I really hope this gets fixed but I don't expect it. I think this kind of stuff is a really slimy thing to do after release. It seems like a bait and switch since it changes the product so drastically.

 

[doofy102]

Honestly this probably for the best. The PS4 versions framerate affected my overall enjoyment of the game. And Im not one of those 60fps or gtfo nazis

But the framerate is still "bad" enough to affect your enjoyment if it did before. Driving through the city still causes those drops.

 

[eso76]

Is POM an effect that only kicks in at a very close distance? Cuz if not, then it may still affect the framerate of just driving through an area and needing to produce to the effect even on the sides of the road or slightly in the distance or whatever.
.

Rather close distance, and it's especially used in the outskirts of the city, where framedrops were non-existant.

And i'd say they were always *very* minor anyway, and not related to the presence of POM (rather, traffic when approaching an intersection).
GTAV on PS4 at least didn't really have any performance issue to justify such cuts, I really don't see R* going out of their way to fix those rare and minor drops.

I can see them disabling those effects for MP and online heists, so my bet is there's probably a bug that made them carry over to the SP. Nothing else.

 

[BigDug13]

What they need to patch is single player. There's no reason to downgrade the entire game just for online. Turn those effects back on when switching to single player then turn them off in multi.

 

[jroc74]

I 'm about to play it to see some of the graphics settings it has in Settings. Those that dont or didnt know, those arent there on the last gen version....IIRC. Seems Rockstar did have PC mentality/options in mind with some of the new settings.

Well that explains why staring at the ground in first person isn't as cool as I remember it being on launch day.

It's quite disappointing. People need to step back from the "give and take" argument and look at the basics here. We're supposed to trust that patches do nothing but improve. Any sort of "give and take" needs to be an informed deal between the dev and the player, but since that's not really possible on consoles, it just shouldn't happen.

I only dabbled in first person here n there, cant remember if I dabbled before or after Heist became available. I did notice some things looking kinda bad, mostly indoors, in first person and that was a factor in me not using it alot, if at all.

Still leaning towards it being a bug, need to see if auto save is working today.

 

[DJSharpeCheddar]

Yea, once you play with an online connection, the checklist option gets replaced by "Jobs"

That's....really stupid.

 

[domlolz]

If memory serves the CPU performance in these consoles are the same as a Core 2 Quad Q6600 or something. Cell is actually better in some regards if I'm not mistaken. To me, that's a huge oversight. You don't ship a console in late 2013 with gimped hardware and call it "next gen".

you can't compare the cpus like that, especially to desktop cpus

 

[Polioliolio]

Well, that's one way to justify a 2 years late $60 PC release.

Haha has it really been so long?
Christ.

 

[chromatic9]

What's going on here? Seems incredibly blurry now, can't just be AF?

 

[SpookyFries]

Is it bad that I can hardly notice a difference?

 

[glaurung]

What's going on here? Seems incredibly blurry now, can't just be AF?

Feels like a more aggressive depth of field effect.

 

[newsguy]

None of that stuff bothered me except the car damage. That shit better be a bug.

 

[Nzyme32]

• Barely anyone noticed any graphical discrepancies
• Some people did notice a performance increase

I'd say this is a net positive. When looking at the reasoning for such a change, outside of the possibility of it being unintentional:

• The game is still developing rather than being a finished product, similar to lots of games
• There could be upcoming DLC that may be more demanding and thus demands such compromise
• Many people grab consoles for a straight forward solution to gaming (although over the years this is less and less the case). It should be expected that very little choice will be given to users in such instances.

 

[rob305]

WOW this is truly UNACCEPTABLE!!!
I cant tell whether these are railroad tracks or if it is a highway

 

[LilJoka]

Experiencing the fps judder on the Xbox 360, i would be happy for you guys that R* saw it as a detriment to playing the game, since it really is hard on the eyes. Its the sole reason i finished the SP quickly then never touched it waiting for the PC version.
Having a nice smooth experience really will be better for overall gameplay imo over some small effects.

 

[chromatic9]

Feels like a more aggressive depth of field effect.

The whole image is blurry, look at the closest sign post in the right corner or the curbs. Maybe some capture issue or some added blur when you go higher that street level?

 

[Clockwork]

I wonder if IQ settings are supposed to be different between the SP campaign and online/heists and they are incorrectly applying the settings to all modes?

In any case I thinks it is a ridiculous change, especially if intentional. I had no performance complaints with the game pre-patch.

 

[AndyD]

I'd bet it's an issue similar to the tree bug it launched with.

Same here. Seems like a bug, as there's no real improvements to warrant the downgrades.

 

[BigDug13]

I just don't get why car damage was downgraded to below last gen visuals. Certainly they don't need to downgrade ANYTHING in this game to below PS360 level graphics do they? Certainly seems too aggressive of a downgrade once you drop it down so far that something comes off worse than last gen.

 

[The Albatross]

People had noticed a much more stable FPS in GTAO, after the heists update. Wonder if it's related.

I just don't get why car damage was downgraded to below last gen visuals. Certainly they don't need to downgrade ANYTHING in this game to below PS360 level graphics do they? Certainly seems too aggressive of a downgrade once you drop it down so far that something comes off worse than last gen.

Car deformation in GTAV (360/PS3 and X1/Ps4) was noticeably worse than GTAIV.